Tag Archives: Mason Adams

Late Night Retro Television Review: Monsters 3.12 “A New Woman”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on YouTube.

Let’s celebrate Christmas early with Monsters!

Episode 3.12 “A New Woman”

(Dir by Brian Thomas Jones, originally aired on December 16th, 1990)

It’s the day before Christmas and businessman Tom (Thomas McDermott) is dying.  His wife, Jessica (Linda Thorson), want him to sign over the deed for several building that he owns so that she can kick out everyone who isn’t paying their rent.  His son (Dan Butler) thinks that is an inhumane thing to do on Christmas.  Tom’s doctor (Mason Adams) informs Jessica that she will be visited by three spirits that will help her change her ways….

And indeed, she is!  But these aren’t the ghosts that Charles Dickens made famous.  Instead, they’re horrifying zombies that are being led by Tom’s vengeful spirit.  That’s enough to scare Jessica into changing her ways.  She doesn’t want to become a zombie!  Who would?  It’s a Merry Christmas for all!

Monsters’s take on A Christmas Carol actually isn’t bad.  It takes a while to get going but the zombies are effectively frightening and Jessica’s terrifying night is full of ominous atmosphere and effective scares.  I guess my main problem with this episode was that the pacing was odd.  It seemed to take forever to get around to that doctor telling Jessica she would receive visitors from the other side.  And when the visitors did arrive, it was effective but it still felt a bit rushed.

Still, it was nice to see Monsters not only do a Christmas episode but also, in a rarity for this show, one that had a happy ending.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 5.5 “Country Blues/Daddy’s Little Girl/Jackpot”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, Gopher almost gets rich!

Episode 5.5 “Country Blues/Daddy’s Little Girl/Jackpot”

(Dir by Don Weis, originally aired on October 31st, 1981)

I have to admit that I groaned a bit when I saw that Florence Henderson was going to be one of the passengers on this week’s cruise.  I still haven’t quite recovered from the trauma of reviewing The Brady Bunch Variety Hour and, whenever Florence Henderson showed up on any of these shows, she always had to sing a song.  Florence wasn’t a bad singer but she wasn’t a particularly interesting one either.  I remember that she always seemed like she was trying too hard to be Barbra Streisand whenever she performed a song of the Brady Bunch Variety Hour.  Her version of Broadway and easy listening was always adequate without being very memorable.

And, on this cruise, Florence does sing.  She’s playing Annabelle Folker, a country singer who is hired to provide entertainment for the cruise.  She sing a few country songs and speaks with a thick (and not very convincing) country accent.  Annabelle is happy to discover that her childhood friend, Martin Correll (James Noble), is on the cruise with his uptight girlfriend and campaign manager, Barbara (Carol Lawrence).  Martin — or Blinky as Annabelle calls him — is thrilled to be reunited with Annabelle.  Barbara is less enthused and she eventually tells Annabelle that, if Martin is ever going to be a success in politics, he can’t spend all of his time with a country singer who says whatever pops into her head.  What’s weird is that Annabelle decides that Barbara is right.  She and Martin aren’t meant for each other.  Martin is too much of a career politician.  In the end, Martin leaves with Barbara and Annabelle leaves alone.  It was a weird story.  Annabelle came across like a stalker but Barbara wasn’t particularly sympathetic either.  Martin was just kind of wimpy.

Meanwhile, Marcy Crane (Randi Oakes) boards the boat with her father, Richard Simmons (Mason Adams).  Marcy’s just gotten a divorce and Richard is very protective of her.  At first, he’s concerned when she meets Dr. Jonathan Hunt (Frank Bonner), a veterinarian.  Once Marcy explains that she’s not going to rush into another relationship and she’s just looking for casual sex, her father gives the couple his blessing.  This was an oddly inconsequential story.

Finally, Gopher finds a bag that’s full of money!  After he counts the money, he discovers that he is now $47,612 richer!  (Adjusted for inflation, that’s the equivalent of $130,000 today.)  Or, at least, that’ll be the case if Gopher keeps the money.  But Gopher’s a good man at heart so, ultimately, he tells Captain Stubing about the money.  Stubing says that money will be Gopher’s if no one claims it at the end of the cruise.  And indeed, it turns out that the money was not lost by any of the current passengers.  Gopher’s happy until he spots a little old woman crying on the dock in Los Angeles.  She says that she took a cruise two weeks ago and lost a bag with her life’s savings.  Gopher gives her the money.  Awwwww!

This was a sweet story and it was kind of nice to see Gopher get a plotline.  Fred Grandy was a likable actor and I always like the episodes where Gopher reveals that he’s actually got a good heart underneath his goofy exterior.  This story did feature one rather silly fantasy sequence, in which Gopher imagined riding in a limousine with Stubing as his chauffeur, Julie as his wife, and Viki as a little beggar child.  It was kind of a weird fantasy, to be honest.

One good story out of three does not make for a great cruise.  I enjoyed Gopher’s plotline but the other two stories alternated between being dull and annoying.  This was not a great cruise.

Retro Television Review: The Night They Saved Christmas (dir by Jackie Cooper)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay.  Today’s film is 1984’s The Night They Saved Christmas!  It  can be viewed on Tubi and YouTube.

The Night They Saved Christmas argues that there are two types of people in the world.

There are people who still believe in Santa Claus and all that he represents and then there are the people who gave up their belief a long time ago.  Those who believe in Santa Claus are still full of the Christmas spirit and, under the right circumstances, they might even get to meet the elves and the jolly old man himself.  Those who do not believe are destined to waste their holiday on focusing on material things that aren’t really important.

Petroleum engineer Michael Baldwin (Paul Le Mat) doesn’t believe in Santa Claus and that’s why he had no trouble moving his entire family to the North Pole so that they could freeze while he headed up an oil exploration project.  Michael and his boss, billionaire Sumner Murdock (Mason Adams), are determined to find oil and they’ve got an endless supply of dynamite with which to search for it.

Michael’s wife, Claudia (Jaclyn Smith), still believes in the spirit of Santa and she encourages their children to believe as well.  For that reason, Ed the Elf (played by singer Paul Williams), is willing to take Claudia and the kids to North Pole City.  They get to meet Santa (Art Carney) and they even learn how Santa uses satellite technology to deliver presents all over the world.  The city is really quite impressive, with the movie making good use of matte paintings and miniatures to create the impression of a magical metropolis.  And Santa turns out to be a pretty nice guy, even if he does tell the elves that he’s sick of them singing Jingle Bells.

Unfortunately, North Pole City is in danger!  Every day, the oil company’s dynamite causes a mini-earthquake.  With the dynamiting getting closer and closer to North Pole City, Santa and the elves worry that they might be on the verge of getting blown up!  Can Claudia and the kids convince Michael to stop blowing up huge chunks of the North Pole before Christmas is ruined!?

Well, listen — I don’t think it’s a spoiler for me to tell you that Christmas is not ruined.  It would be pretty cynical for the movie to end with Michael blowing up Santa Claus and cynical is one thing that The Night They Saved Christmas is not.  This is a very earnest film, full of cheery elves, a paternal Santa, and lots of Christmas music.  Even greedy old Mr. Murdock turns out to be not that bad of a guy.  In the end, this film says that Santa and the spirit of Christmas is for everyone and that’s certainly not a bad message.  It’s a likeable movie for the holiday season and Art Carney is a perfect Santa Claus, even if he does appear to be a little underweight for the role.  As played by Carney, Santa is welcoming, good-humored, and still enthusiastic about his job, even after centuries of doing it.  He’s exactly the way you would want Santa to be.  This is a film that earns the right to wish everyone a merry Christmas!

Under Siege (1986, directed by Roger Young)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Let’s say that you are the governor of Arkansas and, once again, your state is running out of money and will soon not be able to afford to pay its bills.  What do you do?

That was the problem facing Governor Bill Clinton in 1986.  His solution was to allow a big Hollywood production to come down to Little Rock and film someone throwing explosive devices at the state capitol.  The capitol building at Little Rock looks like a smaller version of the capitol building in Washington D.C.  The producers of Under Siege needed to shoot a scene where terrorists attempt to blow up Congress.  Even though the state capitol wasn’t actually blown up in the film, the dome did end up with extensive burn marks that were visible for years afterwards.  Many people in Arkansas were not amused that they had to allow a film crew to set their capitol on fire just to pay the bills.  Still, if Bill Clinton hadn’t agreed to blow up the state capitol building, Arkansas could have gone bankrupt and then he probably would have lost his reelection bid in 1986.  If Bill Clinton wasn’t reelected, he never would have been elected to the presidency in 1992, Hillary Clinton would never have been elected to the Senate in 2000 and, in 2016, the Democrats wouldn’t have been stuck with the only possible nominee who could have actually lost to Donald Trump.  When you look at it that way, Under Siege is one of the most significant films ever made.

As for the film, it’s a 3-hour, made-for-TV movie about what happens when Islamic extremism hits home.  Notorious terrorist Abu Ladeen (Thaao Penghlis) has managed to sneak into the United States and is hiding out in Detroit.  He directs a series of attacks on beloved American institutions.  Not only is the Capitol Building bombed but a mall is also attacked.  While President Maxwell Monroe (Hal Holbrook, who was born to play presidents) tries to keep America from falling apart, his hawkish advisers tell him that now is the time to launch a strike against Iran, despite Iran claiming to have nothing to do with the attacks.  Only the director of the FBI, John Garry (Peter Strauss), and the Secretary of Defense, Andrew Simon (Paul Winfield), argue that the president should exercise caution.  Garry is convinced that the attacks are the result of homegrown, domestic extremism and not an international conspiracy.  Garry is a very hands-on FBI director.  He’s the type of FBI director who will chase a terrorist down a street in Washington D.C.  Let’s see James Comey do that shit.

Under Siege probably seemed outlandish in 1986 but it seems prophetic today.  The film’s depiction of both terrorism and the government’s shady response to it turned out to be accurate.  That doesn’t mean that it’s a very good movie.  It was co-written by Bob Woodward of Watergate and Washington Post fame, so of course John Garry is righteous beyond belief and the solution to all of America’s problem begin with contacting a newspaper editor and blowing the whistle.  America may be under siege but a strongly-worded editorial is here to save the day.

Under Siege used to regularly show up on late night television and the DVD was popular overseas.  (In France, it was called Au Revoir, America.)  Not surprisingly, after 9-11, it vanished from circulation.  If you can find a copy, watch it and ask yourself, “Would I blow up my state capitol just to pay the bills?”

Horror Film Review: Omen III: The Final Conflict (dir by Graham Baker)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Omen_III_the_final_conflict

Originally, it had been planned that the Omen franchise would be made up of six or seven films and that each movie would check in on another year in the life of Damien Thorn, a bit like an apocalyptic version of Boyhood.  However, after Damien: Omen II failed to perform up to expectations, plans were changed.

Instead of continuing the story of Damien’s adolescence, the 1981 film Omen III: The Final Conflict jumps straight into Damien’s adulthood.  Now 32 years old and played by a very young (and handsome) Sam Neill, Damien Thorn is now the CEO of Thorn Enterprises.  With the help of his loyal assistant Harvey Dean (Don Gordon), Damien has become one of the most popular and powerful men on the planet.  Thorn Enterprises, having followed Paul Buhler’s scheme from the second film, is now responsible for feeding a good deal of the world.  Damien is seen as being a humanitarian and a future President.  When the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom reacts to spotting a black dog in the park by committing suicide, Damien is appointed to the position.

(Needless to say, everyone in London is happy to see Damien.  Nobody says, “I just hope you don’t end up going crazy and dying a violent death, like everyone else in your family and immediate circle of acquaintances.”  But they’re probably thinking it…)

Now in London (and also appointed to be head of the United Nations Youth Organization, which just goes to show that your crazy uncle is right and the United Nations is a conspiracy), Damien pursues a rather creepy romance with journalist Kate Reynolds (Lisa Harrow) and makes plans to prevent the Second Coming by killing every single baby born on the morning of March 24th.  (But Harvey’s son was born on March 24th — wow, could this lead to some sort of conflict?)

Meanwhile, a group of priests (led by an embarrassed-looking Rossanno Brazzi) have recovered these damn daggers of Megiddo and are now all attempting to assassinate Damien.  Unfortunately, none of them are very good at their job.  (“You had one job, Father!  One job!”)

Bleh.

The Final Conflict is not that good.  It’s boring.  The plot is full of holes.  For instance — and yes, these are SPOILERS — why have we sat through two movies listening to characters insist that Damien has to be stabbed by all seven of the daggers when apparently, just one dagger will do the job?  Why, after being told that Jesus is going to be reborn as a child, does he then appear as an adult at the end of the film?  And finally, why does nobody ever seem to find it strange that everyone that Damien knows end up suffering a freak accident?

I will say that there are two good things about The Final Conflict.

First off, Sam Neill gives a good performance as Damien Thorn.  He’s handsome, he’s charismatic, and he’s not afraid to be evil.  But, unfortunately, Damien’s just not that interesting of a character anymore.  In the first Omen, he was interesting because he was an evil five year old.  In the second Omen, he was at least occasionally conflicted about his role.  In the third Omen, Damien is just evil and evil without nuance is boring.

Secondly, there’s that sequence where Damien’s followers go after the babies born on March 24th.  Oh my God, that was so disturbing and it was one of the few moments when The Final Conflict actually became horrific.

Otherwise, The Final Conflict is a thoroughly forgettable sequel to a memorable film.